Webflow vs Shopify: Find the Best Platform for Your Store

Table of Contents Hide

Tony Pham Nov 27 2025

Both Webflow vs Shopify have been around for a long time on the market. They are both popular and each has their unique advantage to draw in customers. If you are new to eCommerce, it can be hard to tell which one will suit you better. This article, NextSky will compare Webflow and Shopify across various aspects to help you determine which platform is perfect for your online store.

Shopify vs Webflow: Overview

What is Shopify?

Launched in 2006 in Canada by Tobias Lütke, Daniel Weinand, and Scott Lake, Shopify was created to simplify the process of running an online store. Beyond basic product and payment management, stands out for its rich app ecosystem, offering over 7,000 apps for marketing, SEO, inventory management, and multi-channel selling. A lesser-known feature is Shopify POS, which seamlessly connects online sales with physical stores. Shopify also continuously integrates new payment technologies, AI tools, and analytics to help predict sales trends and optimize revenue.

What is Webflow?

Founded in 2013, Webflow was designed to empower designers and developers to create visually stunning designs while producing clean, production-ready code. Unlike traditional drag-and-drop builders, the platform generates optimized HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, which improves SEO and page speed. Few people know that supports dynamic content through its CMS, allowing you to build blogs, product catalogues, or complex e-commerce sites without a separate backend. Webflow also offers precise control over layout and animations, making it ideal for creating highly custom, visually stunning websites.

Pricing and value for money - Shopify

Shopify

Shopify offers five pricing tiers:

Starter: $5/month
Basic: $39/month
Grow: $69/month
Advanced: $399/month
Plus: Starting from $2,300/month

When paid annually, the Basic, Grow, and Advanced plans are reduced to $29, $49, and $299, respectively (equivalent to a 25% discount). Shopify is currently testing a credit system in some regions that allows a portion of your monthly revenue to be used to offset the subscription fee.

Key differences between Shopify plans:

To build a fully functional professional online store with all essential features, you should choose Basic or higher. The Starter plan is optimized mainly for selling through social media or embedding into existing platforms.
Real-time carrier shipping rates are only available on Advanced and plans, or on the Grow plan if you pay an extra fee or opt for annual billing.
Transaction fees and credit card processing fees decrease as you upgrade plans.
Advanced international selling features (import taxes, duties, etc.) are available from the Advanced plan upward.
Shopify Plus is designed for large enterprises that need powerful APIs, high uptime, advanced automation, and dedicated support.

Webflow

Webflow offers seven main plans, divided into 4 "Site" plans and 3 "Ecommerce" plans:

Starter: $0
Basic: $18/month
CMS: $29/month
Business: $49/month
E-commerce Standard: $42/month
Ecommerce Plus: $84/month
E-commerce Advanced: $235/month

Key differences between Webflow plans:

Page limit: Starter allows only two static pages; other plans allow up to 150 pages.
Bandwidth: From 10GB to 2.5TB/month, depending on the plan.
Full CMS functionality: Available from the CMS plan and above.
E-commerce product limits: From 2,000 to 15,000 products, depending on the plan.
Transaction fees: 2% on Ecommerce Standard, 0% on Ecommerce Plus and Advanced.

Verdict: In terms of price, Webflow is the better option, thanks to its affordable and flexible fees, which are suitable for small businesses. Shopify is more expensive, but it's worth it for large stores that require comprehensive sales features.

Ease of use - Shopify

Shopify

Shopify is a highly experienced e-commerce platform, so it excels at guiding users step-by-step through the process of setting up a store quickly and easily. Thanks to its intuitive interface, clear dashboard, and user-friendly drag-and-drop editor, Shopify enables you to manage content, design pages, and run your store with minimal technical knowledge. This extreme user-friendliness is a massive advantage for beginners—you can confidently build a fully functional store just minutes after signing up.

Webflow

Webflow takes a more advanced and professional approach, combining a powerful website builder with a robust CMS. Because it uses a central canvas and HTML/CSS control panels, Webflow is best suited for users with a design background or those who want complete control over every visual detail.

webflow editor

Although there is plenty of documentation and tutorials, Webflow has a steep learning curve—most users need several weeks to become comfortable. Therefore, for those who prioritize simplicity and fast launch, Webflow is not the most accessible option.

Verdict: Shopify is straightforward to use, quick to set up, and non-technical, making it ideal for beginners. Webflow is powerful but more challenging, requiring a learning curve, and is best suited for individuals with design experience.

Design and templates - Webflow

Shopify

Shopify has only around 985 themes, but every one of them is fully optimized for e-commerce, easy to use, and delivers a smooth, conversion-focused shopping experience. Paid themes ($100 - $500) often come equipped with advanced e-commerce features that cater to the design needs of most online stores. However, in terms of variety and customization freedom, Shopify still falls one step behind Webflow.

Webflow

Webflow clearly wins in this category, with over 2,000 templates (48 of which are free) and an influential visual designer that lets you customize every detail, just like a professional design tool. This gives you the ability to create truly unique, one-of-a-kind designs without being constrained by any fixed framework—an ideal choice for those who value creativity and strong brand individuality.

Webflow themes store

Verdict: Webflow leads the way in design with over 2,000 templates and near-limitless customization

eCommerce Features - Shopify

1. Products & inventory management

Shopify: Unlimited product listings, support for multiple variants, automatic inventory tracking, and bulk import capabilities. This enables large stores to operate efficiently, accurately, and scale seamlessly.

inventory management

Webflow: Limits the number of products depending on the plan (500–3,000 products) and imposes sales caps on lower-tier plans. Although it has inventory tracking tools, scalability is limited, making it more suitable for small stores.

2. Product types

Shopify: Supports physical products, digital products, and services. For digital products, install the free "Digital Downloads" app; the installation process is very straightforward.
Webflow: Supports digital products natively without needing additional apps, making selling files faster and more convenient.

3. Shipping

Shopify: Outstanding with direct integrations to USPS, UPS, DHL and discounted shipping rates. You can purchase and print shipping labels directly in the dashboard, customize shipping rates by weight or region — the entire fulfillment process is exceptionally smooth.
Webflow: Only supports manual setup of shipping rates. For advanced features, you must connect third-party services, such as Shippo, which complicates and makes the process less convenient.

Shopify shipping

4. POS (Point of Sale)

Shopify: Professional POS system with real-time inventory sync between online and physical stores. Ideal for omnichannel retail businesses.
Webflow: Does not support POS at all, a significant limitation for businesses that sell both online and in physical locations.

5. Apps & integrations

Shopify: The Shopify App Store has thousands of apps that let you extend functionality (marketing, SEO, CRM, shipping, accounting, etc.) with just a few clicks.
Webflow: No official App Store. To add features, you must either manually integrate or hire a developer — both of which are time-consuming and expensive.

6. Payment options & transaction fees

Shopify: Shopify Payments enables fast payments with 0% transaction fees. Additionally, Shopify supports over 100 third-party payment gateways, offering maximum flexibility.
Webflow: Only supports Stripe, PayPal, and Apple Pay. The Standard plan charges a 2% transaction fee; higher plans waive it. However, payment gateway options remain very limited.

7. Taxes

Shopify: Automatically calculates accurate taxes for most countries/regions in the US, Canada, EU, UK, and even digital product taxes (e.g., EU VAT MOSS). The "Digital Downloads" app further simplifies compliance, saving time and reducing errors.
Webflow: Provides automatic tax calculation on eCommerce plans. However, users outside the US frequently experience inaccurate tax calculations, particularly for complex digital taxes in the EU. This can lead to legal risks and tax-filing errors.

8. Abandoned cart recovery

Shopify: Built-in abandoned cart recovery is included in most plans (except Starter). It automatically sends reminder emails to customers, significantly boosting revenue. You can trigger emails based on:
- Customers who abandon checkout
- Customers who leave the site with items in the cart
- Customers who viewed products but didn't add anything to the cart, Shopify also allows for deep customization of recovery flows based on customer behaviour, helping you optimize marketing strategies effectively.
Webflow: No built-in abandoned cart recovery. You must pay for third-party apps (e.g., Monto ≈ $20/month) to use this feature, making cart recovery more complicated and costly compared to Shopify.

Verdict: Shopify is a more reliable choice for tax calculations, especially for multinational stores and digital products.

Marketing features - Shopify

1. SEO

Shopify: SEO management is extremely easy. You can directly edit titles, meta descriptions, headings, alt text, URLs, 301 redirects, and robots.txt. Shopify themes are fully responsive, use a global CDN, and automatically generate localized sitemaps for multi-country stores — optimizing both on-page and technical/off-page SEO effectively.
Webflow: Offers similar basic SEO controls, responsive templates, and CDN. However, when heavy interactive animations or complex effects are used, page-load speed can decrease, which may slightly hurt Google rankings.

2. Blogging

Shopify: Built-in blog available from the Basic plan upward. Supports unlimited posts, tagging for categorization, and RSS feeds — helping drive organic traffic effectively.
Webflow: Webflow’s CMS is more powerful, allowing categorization with both tags and categories. However, the number of blog posts is capped by plan (CMS plan: 2,000 posts; Business plan: 20,000 posts), which can be restrictive for high-volume content creators and bloggers.

3. Email Marketing

Shopify: Shopify Email is built-in, featuring a drag-and-drop builder and pre-made templates. You get 10,000 free emails per month, plus basic automation (welcome emails, upsell/cross-sell, win-back campaigns, browse abandonment, etc.).
Webflow: No native email marketing tool. You can easily connect third-party platforms (Mailchimp, GetResponse, AWeber, etc.), but there is no built-in solution or free sending quota.

4. Analytics

Shopify: Comprehensive built-in reporting dashboard covering sales, customers, marketing performance, search data, finance, and abandoned carts. You can also create custom reports — everything is visual and eCommerce-focused without needing extra apps.

shopify analytics

Webflow: The native “Analyze” tool is paid ($29–$299/month). Most users rely on Google Analytics, but eCommerce tracking must be set up manually and lacks the intuitive, commerce-specific dashboards that Shopify provides out of the box.

5. Social media integration

Shopify: Deep, native integrations for selling directly on social platforms, running Google Ads, and using Facebook Pixel. You can embed feeds and icons, plus access hundreds of apps (Snapchat Ads, Pinterest “Pin It,” Video Crockpot for product videos, etc.), making social media marketing highly effective and expandable.

shopify social media

Webflow: Supports selling on social and embedding feeds, but only offers around 13 third-party social apps (e.g., EmbedSocial, EmbedStories, Twitter Share). Expansion and customization options are much more limited compared to Shopify.

Verdict: Shopify clearly dominates in marketing features — stronger SEO control, unlimited blogging, built-in email marketing with free sends, superior analytics, and far richer social/media integrations. Webflow excels at visual design but lacks depth and native tools for comprehensive marketing.

AI capabilities - Shopify

Shopify

Shopify integrates two main AI-powered tools: Shopify Magic and Shopify Sidekick, helping store owners automate numerous tasks:

Shopify Magic: Generates product descriptions, marketing emails, live-chat responses, and AI-powered product image editing.
Shopify Sidekick: Analyzes store data, provides actionable insights, automatically creates content, and assists with store setup.

Thanks to these tools, Shopify optimizes operations, boosts creativity, drives sales, and significantly reduces daily manual work for merchants.

Webflow

Webflow AI currently offers 7 built-in tools that work directly inside the Designer to help you build, manage, and optimize websites:

Generate entire websites and design systems from text prompts
Write and edit CMS content
Create and adjust layouts/sections according to your design
Generate CMS items in bulk or individually
CRO (conversion rate optimization) suggestions
SEO checks with best-practice recommendations
Chat assistant that helps write code, create components, and build advanced workflows

As a result, Webflow AI saves considerable time on website management while improving performance and content quality.

Verdict: Both platforms leverage AI effectively, but Shopify stands out with AI tools specifically tailored for store management and revenue growth.

Performance and security - A Tie

Shopify

Fully PCI DSS compliant with standard SSL certificates, Shopify keeps customer data secure. The platform automatically handles backups and system updates, so merchants don’t need to worry about day-to-day security. That said, periodic manual backups are still recommended for extra data safety.

Webflow

Security is a top priority for Webflow. It is PCI DSS compliant (protecting credit and debit card information), provides SSL encryption for sensitive data, and performs automatic backups and updates. Merchants can operate with peace of mind, though manual periodic backups are still advised to minimize unexpected risks.

Verdict: Both Webflow and Shopify deliver excellent performance and security, neither platform has a clear advantage in this category.

Scalability and growth potential

Shopify

Purpose-built for businesses that want to grow fast and large. Shopify provides unlimited products and bandwidth, multi-store management, and Shopify Plus with high-level automation and dedicated support. It also includes POS integration, advanced analytics, and extensive automation tools that efficiently handle every aspect of a growing business.

Webflow

Best suited for creative businesses, medium-sized stores, and design-focused projects. It offers a powerful built-in CMS, custom code capabilities, and lightweight eCommerce suitable for small stores. However, when scaling to large inventories or needing advanced automation, Webflow hits limitations. Ideal for freelancers, SaaS companies, and content-driven businesses.

Verdict: Shopify is the clear winner for scalability and long-term growth potential, especially for merchants planning to expand significantly.

Customer support - Shopify

Shopify

Shopify outperforms Webflow in customer support thanks to its diverse channels of AI chat, live chat, and email. Shopify also offers multilingual documentation in 21 different languages, making information more accessible to users. Business plans also include phone support if needed.

Shopify customer support

Webflow

Webflow primarily offers email support, with phone support only available for business users. Webflow’s documentation is only available in English, which is limited for international users. However, the quality of online tutorials on both platforms is high, with clear, easy-to-understand, and comprehensive instructions.

Verdict: Shopify has a clear advantage in customer support thanks to its diverse support channels and multilingual documentation.

Webflow vs Shopify Quick Key Points

Shopify is a full-fledged online store with extensive eCommerce features, SEO capability, blog, inventory management features,... However, you need coding skills to make your theme look truly unique.

Shopify is the better option if:

You require a comprehensive eCommerce solution with features like multi-channel selling and extensive customization options.
You want to build a long-term, scalable online store with a focus on brand building and customer retention.
Mobile responsiveness and SEO optimization are crucial for your online presence.
You prefer a platform with a large user base and extensive community support.

Webflow only provides the basic features for an eCommerce website. However, Webflow’s strongest suit is its visual capability. It provides all the tools you need to make your website look beautiful without knowing any coding.

Webflow is the better option if:

Your store doesn’t sell a lot of products and you have no use for advanced eCommerce features yet.
You want a website with unlimited customization without any coding knowledge.
You want to host your own website or let another hosting provider do it.
You don’t want to put in money, just do it for a hobby, or aren’t really to commit anything yet.
You want a website to showcase content and not to build an online store.

Tags: